The Complete Guide to Buying and Selling Apartment Buildings (Paperback)
By admin. Filed in chicago multi family real estate |Tags: Apartment, Buildings, Buying, Complete, Guide, Paperback, Selling
Product Description
Whether youre a first-time real estate investor or a seasoned professional, The Complete Guide to Buying and Selling Apartment Buildings helps you map out your future, find apartment buildings at a fair price, finance purchases, and manage your properties. Now revised and expanded, this Second Edition includes tax planning advice, case studies of real acquisitions, and appendixes that add detail to the big picture. Plus, it includes a handy glossary of all the terms investors need to know, helpful sample forms that make paperwork quick and easy, and updated real estate forecasts. With this comprehensive guide at hand youll find profits easy to come by.
From the Back Cover
A revised and expanded edition of the bestselling guide to investing in apartment buildings
Investing in real estate is a tried-and-true way to build assets, increase income, and prepare for retirement or the expense of college. With the proper guidance, a well-defined plan, and a little capital, anyone can profit by buying and selling rental properties.
Whether you’re a first-time investor or a seasoned professional, this straightforward guide helps you map out your future, find apartment buildings at a fair price, finance purchases, and manage your properties. If you’re an active real estate investor focused on single-family properties, Steve Berges’s step-by-step plan shows you how to make the jump to multifamily units.
The Complete Guide to Buying and Selling Apartment Buildings includes tax planning advice, case studies of real acquisitions, and appendixes that add detail to the big picture. This new Second Edition also includes a handy glossary of all the terms investors need to know, helpful sample forms that make paperwork quick and easy, and updated real estate market forecasts. Inside you’ll find:
- Ten ways to create value
- Six ways to locate multifamily properties
- Five key ratios every investor should know
- Two crucial techniques that will help any investor save thousands
- Three ways to determine how much a piece of property is really worth
- Five cardinal rules of successful negotiations
- Six reasons sellers sell their property
- Four effective exit strategies
- Five keys to your success
- And much more
Buy The Complete Guide to Buying and Selling Apartment Buildings (Paperback) at Amazon
Tuesday, June 23rd 2009 at 12:41 am |
5.0 out of 5 stars
Exceptional Industry Book
After 5 intensive months watching numerous webinars, listening to tens of teleseminars and buying and reading various e-books and other material – this book put it all into…
Tuesday, June 23rd 2009 at 3:14 am |
This book is an easy read, but those who considered it the “best” real estate book out there may have been rotting their brains on no money down schemes (this book thankfully notes that beginning investors will not find a no money down investment property deal).
If you are looking for Real Estate Investing 101, this is a good choice.
If you already understand Cap Rates and NOI, and are confident in your ability to estimate the value of a property based on its financial statement, then pass on this book.
All in all, the book is good but basic. Unfortunate that the tables presented in the text are not explained fully–the author prefers, I think, to sell you the software separately.
Tuesday, June 23rd 2009 at 6:27 am |
4.0 out of 5 stars
Informative but at times numbers are a bit optimistic
This is an excellent book for those starting out in this business. It has motivated me to acquire my first investment property.
Tuesday, June 23rd 2009 at 8:28 am |
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Complete Guide to Apartment Buildings and then some….
Steve is a prodigious writer of numerous real estate investing books. That said, this one is my favorite.
Tuesday, June 23rd 2009 at 9:26 am |
As a real estate investor and author myself, I read a lot of real estate books. Many, if not most, are written by folks who do not invest in real estate themselves; they only write about it. Berges is not one of them. He knows his stuff and it’s clear that he practices what he preaches. I have read three of his books and, I must say, he’s one of my favorite real estate authors. You can trust what he says. Experienced investors may want a bit more detail from Steve, but what he does say is accurate and safe. This is a good book on buying apartments. In fact, in my own book, “Investing in Duplexes, Triplexes & Quads,” I list the best books I’ve read on different areas of real estate. This book is the ONLY book I recommend on investing in commercial multifamily (ie, apartments of 5 units and up) properties.
Having given those accolades, here are a few of my constructive criticisms:
1. On pages 37 and 38, Steve gives nice charts illustrating the long-term financial benefits of investing in multifamily properties. On page 39, however, there is an error in referring to the big numbers shown. The reference is made to Investor A’s “equity” of $2.1 million and Investor B’s (the multifamily property investor) equity of $92 million. I just don’t think Steve caught this, but those numbers don’t refer to the investor’s equity, but to the fair market value of his collective assets (his properties). The investor’s equity might be in the range of 20% of that. I do like the charts, however, and I used a similar analysis in my recent book. One other note on the charts – they presume selling and buying exactly at the end of one year – a difficult task as Steve would surely admit. On average, I think 18 months to two years is a better time frame for flipping apartments.
2. Refinancing – Steve didn’t give a chart showing the long-range effect of the “buy, hold and refy” strategy (using proceeds to buy again, but retaining the first property). In addition, Steve only mentioned the general banking guideline that you can only pull out cash up to 80% of the new appraised value (i.e., the bank has an LTV of 80%). However, you can get around this. I’ve done it. It requires a second lender giving a second mortgage, with a CLTV (combined loan to value) of up to 90%. As such, you can pull out much more cash.
3. GRM – gross rent multiplier. In his financial analysis section, Steve doesn’t give much detail or provide real life examples on this crucial analysis factor. Granted, the cap rate is the analysis primarily used for commercial real estate, while the GRM is the one used for residential multifamily (2-4 units) real estate. Since many owners and selling brokers will “fudge” on expenses, a cap rate can be very hard to verify. The GRM, however, is fairly simple – just look at the lease agreements.
4. Lack of coverage on residential multifamily apartments. In fact, this is why I wrote my book on this topic. If Steve had covered it here, I would not have written mine. I like Steve’s writing style and he knows his stuff. But for investing in small multifamily properties (certainly on residential, but probably up to about 10 units), we really have to cover valuation and selection of properties using the GRM. That and I felt like the “buy, hold, and refy” strategy needed much more coverage.
But for investing in commercial multifamily properties, I recommend this book as the only good one on the market.
Larry Loftis
Author: Investing in Duplexes, Triplexes and Quads: The Fastest and Safest Way to Real Estate Wealth
Tuesday, June 23rd 2009 at 2:27 pm |
4.0 out of 5 stars
Qualified reference without the fluff
This book presents a well written and comprehensive guide to buying and selling apartment buildings.
Tuesday, June 23rd 2009 at 5:08 pm |
Beyond the beginners books. If you dont want to fool around with rental houses are looking beyond, to getting into more commercial projects, read this one.
Covers the numbers (which is the only way these types of properties are evaluated,) how to create value, locating properties, due diligence and negotiating, financing and when and how to sell.
The market is flooded with marginal tomes on flipping single family houses, buying rental houses, no money down deals, ad nauseum. This is a breath of fresh air.
Tuesday, June 23rd 2009 at 7:04 pm |
5.0 out of 5 stars
excellent resource
provides a good overall basic understanding of buying smaller multifamily properties (2 to 25 unit properties) that will undoubtedly help prevent real estate newbies from losing…
Wednesday, June 24th 2009 at 12:02 am |
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great intro book to uncover the basics.
This is the first book I have read that focused solely on buying multi-family real estate. It uncovered some basic information for me, and I consider it a great primer for future…
Wednesday, June 24th 2009 at 1:17 am |
5.0 out of 5 stars
Best book – Always recommended
This book (and the software sold by the author) provide an excellent strategy to look at and purchase income producing property.
Wednesday, June 24th 2009 at 8:04 am |
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Must Read For Anyone Thinking About Jumping In To Multi-Unit Investing
Steve Berges has put together a well thought out and informative book for the beginning to intermediate level multi-unit apartment investor.
Wednesday, June 24th 2009 at 9:35 am |
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Great Introductory Investment Real Estate Overview
I’ve read several realestate investment books and this is the most comprehensive. It covers all aspects of finding, negotiating, financing and managing apartment building…
Wednesday, June 24th 2009 at 11:27 am |
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Read, Extremely Valuable.
With all the hype out there in the real estate investing space, it’s refreshing to read a book that is honest, intellectual, and driven by a solid foundation in financial…